Quillifer Contest!
by wjw on October 9, 2017
” . . . chockful of derring-do, blood and thunder, swashbuckling, and other good stuff evocative of Rafael Sabatini, Sir Walter Scott, and the penny-bloods: venomous and dangerous court politesse, reversals, betrayals, cowardice, heroism, illicit sex, allegorical theatrical productions, dangerous hunting expeditions, privateering and, at last, open warfare against the forces of Clayborne. During all of these excursions, Quillifer maintains his admirable sangfroid and cheek, never quite a full hero, but never a total antihero either. Despite Orlanda’s presence, it’s not precisely a tale of Swords and Sorcery. Rather, you might dub it Rogues and Rogering.”
Rogues and Rogering? Gotta like that. Since I invented Swords and Singularity with Implied Spaces, I now seem responsible for a couple of subgenres.
Gary K. Wolfe also wrote a laudatory review in Locus, but it’s not online so I can’t link to it. In it, he mentions a Donald Barthelme story about a National Writer’s Examination in which participants are required to come up with four archaic words for “sword.”
So let’s do that! Give me four archaic words for sword, and the three best lists will win a free audiobook of Quillifer.
En Garde!
Paul Di Filippo wrote a lovely review of Quillifer for Locus Online. Here’s your takeaway:
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Four archaic words for sword:
brand
steel
glaive
falchion
Firkins and merkins?
Here’s four: stoneless, rapacitator, kuchitana, & slicelad.
Do you like them? I just made them up. They will be archaic one day.
Poniard is the only one I can think of offhand. Which is ok, since I’m not an audiobook type of guy anyway.
But rogering? (Or should that be “butt rogering”?) That’s something done to cabin boys, not noble sluts.
Four ancient cultures with swords:
gladius
xiphos
khopesh
billao
and one still in use: parang.
Kopis, spatha, jian, dha arranged in order to flow best when spoken aloud!
Huzzah!
Four ancient(ish) words for sword:
hanger
spadroon
tickler
pigsticker
Rapier
Cutlass
Dirk
Scimitar
I knew that “glaive” and “falchion” would appear! Surprised there were no bastard swords.
Thanks, everyone, for participating! Winners are Paul Weimer, d (for getting into the spirit of the novel), and Mangrove, for “spadroon.” Because you can’t have too many spadroons.